One of my favorite authors, Neil Gaiman, has become the political football du jour, caught in the middle of a firestorm of criticism. What happened was this – Neil was asked to speak at a library function in a small suburban area and they offered his usual speaking fee. He asked who was actually paying the fee and found that the library itself was not, but rather a foundation designed to pay for these types of events and, on top of that, if the money was not used soon it would go away per the structure of the foundation. So Neil agreed to speak and promptly set it up for the entire speaking fee to be split between two needy charities. He did the event, which by all accounts went off swimmingly, the charities got their much needed funds, and all was well, right? Not so fast…..
There are some who seem to believe that Neil should not have taken his fee from a library/his fee could have been better spent on librarian salaries/buying books/what have you. There are others who feel his fee is outrageous. There are those who feel he’s a “douche” for even charging at all, that he should be giving back because he already has so much. Let’s take on a few of these points, shall we?
1) Neil should not have taken his fee from a library, etc. –
He didn’t. They offered funds from a separate foundation to pay the fee. The library’s operating funds were never touched. The foundation money is also structured in such a way that those funds could not be used to pay librarian salaries, or buy books, or for anything other than special events, and it was about to go away. The money had been awarded the previous year and if the library didn’t use it soon the money would be lost.
2) Neil’s fee is outrageous –
Neil Gaiman’s fee is in the neighborhood of $45,000 for an engagement, which he readily admits is high. He does to keep the volume of speaking requests at a manageable level, because he’d rather be writing not working the lecture circuit, which makes sense given that he’s a writer. And really, compared to other speakers, his fee is not all that high. Many political and business speakers demand, and get, in excess of six figures. Personally, I think Neil is worth the fee he asks for. I’ve heard him speak and he’s brilliant.
3) Neil’s a “douche” for charging, needs to give back, etc. –
To begin with, Neil already gave all the money he earned from this engagement to needy charities. I’d call that giving back. Also, he frequently does do pro bono speaking engagements for worthy groups like libraries and schools, and in fact, earlier that week had done two pro bono engagements, one to raise funds for charity.
But what really gets under my skin about this whole kerfuffle is the overarching assumption that Neil should not be making those kinds of fees. Why? He’s a talented writer. His imagination is amazing. His books regularly make best seller lists all over the world, and get optioned to be made into movies (several are already done – Stardust, Coraline, et al.). Fans wait in huge lines for hours just for the chance to have him sign something and get their picture taken with him. In the scifi/fantasy world, the man is quite the rock star.
So what’s the problem with him earning a lot of money? He’s extremely good at what he does, one of the best. There are legions of fans eager to buy his work. He works hard and puts out a lot of “product.” He gives back to the community on a frequent basis (going at least part of the way to show he’s a stand up guy, and not douche-y at all). Why shouldn’t he earn a big payday?
Oh, that’s right. He’s an artist. He’s not a movie star or an athlete or any other type of person our culture readily accepts as getting huge paychecks. For the most part our culture seems to believe that artists should be grateful for being paid at all, especially if they are earning more than a subsistence level. And that, my friends, is what I think there should be a kerfuffle about, not that Neil Gaiman earned a large fee and gave it to charity.
